Ad contractor defrauds SDMC of Rs 7.3 crore

New Delhi: Delhi Police said on Friday that the Economic Offence Wing (EOW) has registered an FIR against one Ashish Kumar accused of defaulting in paying licence fees, and subletting allotted tenders to others on the complaint of an SDMC Commercial Officer.

Kumar, operating his own proprietary business had picked up 11 tenders from SDMC between the years of 2011 and 2012 to put up

advertisements on uni-poles/toilet blocks at different locations in Delhi. His offences, the complainant said, cost the government losses of

Rs 7.3 crore.

The rights to advertise on these sanctioned locations were approved for three years, during which the accused cheated the SDMC and used these sites for his own benefit. Kumar's operation relied on first acquiring the tenders by depositing the initial amount required, and then producing false letters of impediments in running the sites, citing absurd and illogical reasons for not paying the complete monthly licence fees.

The SDMC after issuing multiple demand letters and show cause notices discovered that Kumar's business was fraudulently profiting from these tenders by subletting them to other entities.

A note from the then Deputy Commissioner (Advertisement) showed that one of the uni-poles allotted to Kumar displayed advertisements from ABC Outmedia.

This meant that Kumar was either running his sites under the name of another company or subletting his uni-pole sites to this other company, both of which would have been in breach of contract, said the complainant, while filing the incident report.